


All in a Day's Work

by amusewithaview



Category: The Avengers (2012), Thor (2011)
Genre: ALL WILL BECOME CLEAR, Darcy herds cats, Fury is manipulative, and I did, because the Avengers are scary if you think about it, but not TOO dark, oh my fic, this is a slightly darker take on things
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-27
Updated: 2012-05-26
Packaged: 2017-11-06 02:10:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/413552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amusewithaview/pseuds/amusewithaview
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first thing Darcy thought when she found out they were moving in to Stark Mansion was, “<i>OHMYGODWHAT</i>.”</p><p>The first thing Darcy thought upon actually <i>meeting</i> all of the Avengers was, “My god, how did these people save the world?  <i>Oh my god</i>, how are we all still living <i>not</i> under alien rule?!”  ...and then she had to go lie down for a while (on her brand new bed in her brand new room in the refurbished Stark Mansion) and process her life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All in a Day's Work

The first thing Darcy thought when she found out they were moving in to Stark Mansion was, “OHMYGODWHAT.”

The first thing Darcy thought upon actually _meeting_ all of the Avengers was, “My god, how did these people save the world? _Oh my god_ , how are we all still living _not_ under alien rule?!” ...and then she had to go lie down for a while (on her brand new bed in her brand new room in the refurbished Stark Mansion) and process her life.

See, the thing of it was that the Avengers? Totally worked on paper. Darcy knew this, she was good at paper, like, _really_ good. Good enough that she could assist Jane at the science, even with her rudimentary high school knowledge of physics and astronomy. Good enough that Jane actually kept her around after Darcy finished her _political_ science degree, in spite of all of the SHIELD scientists panting (sometimes literally, and wasn't _that_ incredibly creepy?) after the honor of being her assistant. _Good enough_ , that SHIELD had decided to “promote” her to a full-time, live-in, lab-tech for the scientific portion of the Avengers.

Which was...a dubious honor on the best days and an absolute nightmare the rest of the time.

She spent most of her first week mourning the beautiful image of them she'd had built up in her head, because that whole working on paper thing? It might have translated perfectly to the battlefield (she wasn't arguing with the results, okay? The results were spectacular and spoke for themselves, re: _not_ under alien rule) but in real life? In-between the missions and (sometimes) the training?

They were a fucking train-wreck.

All of those different (deadly) specialities came from equally diverse backgrounds and lead to wildly opposite views (she still hasn't worked out how, exactly, six people can ALL HAVE OPPOSITE VIEWS, but somehow the Avengers manage it) and stem from really, _really_ fucked up emotional pain and trauma and... in the day-to-day? Darcy isn't sure whether they collectively need the Greatest Therapist in the World, the Largest Xanax, or just an epically awesome hug.

(Or possibly all three.)

She vacillates, in that first week, between thanking her lucky stars that they managed to pull together long enough to thwart Loki and his evil army of Chi-thingies (the name sounded like a sneeze to her, seriously) and getting down on her knees and thanking all the powers and gods in the universe (except the Norse ones, _fuck_ the Norse ones – Thor excluded) that none of them had decided to use their powers for evil, singularly or in groups.

Because here's the _second_ thing Darcy thought upon meeting the Avengers, the thing that she's been keeping close to her chest the last week, the thing that she doesn't want to examine too closely even within the (presumed, because you never know with this group) privacy of her own mind: if the Avengers ever wanted to, any of them, they could Fuck This World Up.

This world, not just America, not just New York – the _world_.

Starting with the _least_ scary (and oh god, it's like rating poisonous snakes: any of them could kill you, but some will do it _faster_ and with less provocation), you have Clint Barton. Clint _Hawkeye_ Barton who, under Loki's less-than-moral direction, managed to kill more than a few dozen of his own (equally well-trained?) fellow agents, infiltrate labs and steal priceless elements, oh, and _nearly bring down the Helicarrier_. Dude's the greatest shot in the world, or at least that's the hype, and Darcy sees no reason not to believe it. He's also trained in espionage, snipery, infiltration, and a whole host of other things that could lead to toppled governments and anarchy in little to no time if he ever got it into his head to go AWOL.

And that's assuming that Barton would go off _alone_. Which he wouldn't, because he wouldn't have to, because he would have Natasha Romanov, the motherfucking _Black Widow_ with him, and wasn't _that_ a terrifying call-sign? Seriously, Darcy would like to know who comes up with this shit, and whether or not the Heap Bigwigs in Charge don't wonder, sometimes, if it's really worth it to have someone on the payroll whose skill-set inspires the nickname _Black Widow_.

Keep your friends close, enemies closer? Whatever.

Suffice to say that Natasha is a Scary Bitch. She's everything Darcy had ever imagined a ninja would be: smart, fast, deadly, and inconspicuous. Honestly, it's the _smart_ that Darcy finds the most terrifying. Clint may be deadly enough to topple regimes, but Natasha would know which ones to hit first, and who to kill to _keep_ them down. If the two of them ever went AWOL together (knock on wood, spill salt over your shoulder, and _grab a rabbits-foot, stat_ ) Darcy planned to head for the hills and a nice little bunker to wait out the End Times.

And those were the two _relatively normal_ ones on the team.

Then you had Thor, a literal _god out of myth_ , and yeah, they could be taken down: Loki had been beaten, after all. Loki had also been working largely _on his own_. Loki had had only himself, what agents he could brainwash, and that borrowed army. Thor was the prince of his people. Darcy was a polisci major who vividly remembered her courses on British Colonialism. 'Nuff said.

Tony Stark was a genius. Literally one of, if not, _the_ greatest minds of the times. Before he decided to give peace a chance, he was responsible for somewhere around 95% of the arms innovations of the times. He had lots of other, more benevolent patents, but Darcy could never forget that even if he was focusing all of that martial creativity into the Iron Man suit, now – he still had that potential.

And those funds.

And a functional AI who was so much like Ender's Jane that it was scary and who, while possessed of a snarky British voice and demeanor that Darcy totally appreciated, was incredibly loyal to his creator (she wouldn't say _fanatically_ loyal, but only because that implied a lack of understanding of Tony's foibles. JARVIS was aware of Tony's flaws and, whenever possible, took pains to mitigate them, making Tony all the more effective and the duo _all the more terrifying_ ).

Finally, the last two who were (somehow) both the most and least threatening of all.

Bruce Banner, brilliant scientist. Hulk, his alter-ego, brilliant smash-enthusiast. Darcy didn't think that either of them could be killed, she'd heard rumors that Bruce had tried and Hulk had stopped him – she believed them. Hulk was the living embodiment of an unstoppable force. In a very personal I-live-with-you-now sort of way, Darcy found that terrifying. In the more general I-fear-for-the-world sort of way... it was sort of comforting. Bruce was, like, the calmest, most peaceful and serene and a whole lotta other words synonymous with “sedate,” person that she had ever met. Hulk... took his cues from Banner, even if they were totally subconscious. Banner didn't want to kill the President and could care less about what didn't directly affect him – it sounded bad when put that way, but it was sort of comforting.

Darcy didn't have to worry about Bruce trying to do something scarily helpful like _fix the US government_ because ultimately Bruce didn't _care:_ so long as he was left alone, presumably with some sort of research, he would be fine. _Hulk_ would be fine. The world would keep on spinning on its pleasantly-crooked axis and Darcy would have her overpriced coffee in the morning.

The last person on the list: Steve _Captain America_ Rogers. The man who'd been put on ice for seventy years, and, it seemed to Darcy, hadn't really thawed out. He'd stepped straight from World War II to modern-day New York, and a world still at war – though in different ways. He'd lost everything he had: his friends, his family, his unit, and, to a certain extent, his country. All the things he'd been fighting for, gone in an instant and replaced with what must seem like cheap, plastic alternatives.

She hoped to god that no-one ever showed him the movie Inception, it would probably be all that was necessary to tip him over into a psychotic break. Because here's the thing she's noticed about Steve, about Tony, about all of the Avengers: they're barely holding it together.

They've all got PTSD to such an extent that Darcy almost wants to rename it something else, something with "superhero" in the title and lay claim to the discovery. Clint is still recovering from the most epic mindscrew, ever. Natasha is hovering over him the way only an overprotective ninja can (with knives and sparring and tough love). Bruce is recovering from his first (slightly positive) foray into the public eye and still chafing at the (largely imagined) restrictions that SHIELD has for him. Tony is off booze as a coping mechanism, but Darcy's pretty that's only because he's discovered that defying death and playing god is somehow more satisfying. Steve is... Steve is a man lost. They're all walking on eggshells, poised to attack, flinching at shadows, and _living with people just as deadly as they are_.

Thor's back in Asgard, but he jumps down when he can, for days at a time. He looks like more and more heartbroken and heartsick and just _worn out_ every time Darcy sees him, and she can tell that Jane helps, but their relationship is new and Loki's trial just _wears_ on him.

He's the reason that Jane (and by extension, Darcy) have been moved into the Mansion. The conversation went something like this: it was morning (as in, she had just woken up - morning is relative to science, okay?), and Darcy was about to grab a cup of the coffee she knew Jane would have made by now (it was nine on a Sunday, PM because science keeps weird hours and Thor is _ridiculously_ accomodating), but when she reached the doorway to their shared kitchen she saw the god slumped, head in hands, at the counter, and Jane so wrapped up in comforting him that she didn't even notice the almost-intrusion.

“He is so _angry_ with me, with us," Thor said, tone lost and hurt and bewildered. "I do not understand how I could have missed such pain.” Jane made appropriately soothing noises and stroked his hair, looking far more worried than Darcy had ever seen her look over something that was inarguably Not Science. “He blames father for most of it, but I know, I _know_ , that I carry much of the blame. I – I did not see, and he did not tell me, and now, it seems he is lost to his own hurts, to madness and I...”

Darcy watched him wrap his arms around Jane, holding her so tightly that she was surprised she wasn't hearing the tiny scientist's ribs creaking. He was shaking, just a little, a fine tremor making his skin shiver, and his tension was so obvious that Darcy couldn't even appreciate the fine sight that a shirtless Thor made.

“I do not wish to lose him, but I cannot see a way to save him, Jane. I _cannot_. And I – I fear for you, Jane. I fear what pains our love may bring to you, I fear for your safety, I fear that my enemies may find you here and take you from me while I am gone and that I will come back and find you as lost to me as Loki.” He lifted his head for that last bit and oh, Darcy does not, _does not_ want to know what terrible grief is on Thor's face, to make Jane cry like that: silent weeping that makes _her_ heart ache and she's only getting the pain second – no, _third_ – hand.

“They,” Jane starts, stops, takes a deep breath and soldiers on, “they made me an offer, a while ago. To move me in with the Avengers.”

Thor says nothing.

“If – they have a lab, I could do almost all my research on-site, and Stark and Banner are both brilliant in their respective fields, I'm already in contact with them. I could move, conceivably. The whole team lives there, and I would be... I would probably be _safer_...?”

She can't see what look is on Thor's face, but Jane is smiling a little, and her tears are clearing up. They hug, and Darcy makes the executive decision to retreat to her room, sans coffee, because those two have a tendency to make wild, passionate, _loud_ love to each other on whatever flat surface is handy. There are a _lot_ of flat surfaces in their kitchen. Darcy has cleaned all of them. _Several times_.

 _So_ , Darcy had thought to herself, _Jane's moving to the Avengers Mansion. Huh._

It took a minute (she blames the lack of coffee) for the full import of that to sink in.

 _She'll probably insist I move with her._ She sat up straight in bed, _OHMYGODWHAT._

They were moved in by the next week, and the week after that Darcy started worrying about the fate of the free world. And her own fate, but she realistically decided that that was slightly less important.

**Author's Note:**

> So, I got the idea for this by reading (in quick succession) a fic where Tony is a supervillain and then a fic where Tony is obsessive over Coulson (because he dies, see, but then he COMES BACK and Tony has FEELS all over the place) - the former was by pprfaith, the latter by Jade_Dragoness - and they got me to thinking.
> 
> I cannot recommend either of them highly enough, they are AWESOME. Go read, shoo.
> 
> Anyhoo, _those_ combined with the Epic Meddling of Fury in the movie, sort of... congealed in my head, and you get this. There is a plot, I promise. And an arc, even. Hopefully, eventually, this will be what I envision it to be in my head: a careful character-study and genesis of the Avengers from scary people to Team With Purpose.
> 
> Thoughts? Suggestions? Comments?


End file.
